Sunday, November 29, 2015

Religion, Refugees and the Law: Where Jesus Meets Muhammad Today

By Rudy
Barnes, Jr., November 29, 2015

The
teachings of Jesus and Muhammad continue to resonate throughout the world, and
where Muslim refugees seek asylum in Europe and America the relationship of
those teachings to politics and the law has created points of conflict. Senator Ted Cruz has said that no
Muslims—only Christians—should be admitted to the U.S., while President Obama
has said that a religious test to evaluate asylum seekers would be “shameful”
and “not American.” Can religion be
considered in deciding whether to admit refugees to the U.S.?

The
answer is yes—but Michael W. McConnell has pointed out that both Cruz and Obama
are wrong. While religious belief should
not be the basis for excluding refugees, it should be considered in deciding
who to admit as refugees. The
Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 defines a refugee as a person who has fled from a country and cannot return
because of a well-founded fear of persecution on account of religion—as well as race, nationality,
political opinion or membership in a particular social group.

There
are other ways a person’s religion can be relevant to their refugee status. All refugees admitted to the U.S. should accept
the Constitution as the supreme law of the land, but fundamentalist Muslims who
put Islamic law (shari’a) above secular law and do not recognize government as separate
from their religion cannot do that. That
is evident in the apostasy and blasphemy laws in Islamic cultures that preclude
the freedoms of religion and speech that are an integral part of the U.S.
Constitution and the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights.

The
concept of legitimacy with its two components of voluntary moral standards and
coercive legal standards can help resolve these issues of politics and law. So long as religious rules of behavior are
voluntary and not imposed on others as coercive legal standards, they are compatible
with democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law. But when a religion advocates God-made law
over libertarian human rights and man-made secular law, it is subversive to the
principles of libertarian democracy.

It
is on this point that Judaism, Christianity and Islam differ. Moses and Muhammad both taught the supremacy
of God’s law as a standard of legitimacy and righteousness. Jesus was a Jew who taught the supremacy of love over law and summarized that
principle in the greatest commandment
to love God and your neighbor as yourself—including your unbelieving neighbor. Putting
the primacy of love over law allows
believers to embrace advances in knowledge and reason, including democracy,
human rights and the secular rule of law, while the holy laws of Moses and
Muhammad keep believers mired in the obsolescence of ancient times.

At
the root of religious conflict today are religious laws that fundamentalists seek
to impose on others. If Jesus and
Muhammad were to meet today, they would embrace the concept of love over law and seek to reconcile
their followers into a universal family
of God. They would emphasize their
teachings as moral imperatives of faith rather than coercive laws to prevent
their followers from imposing a tyrannical theocracy, and would recognize
advances in knowledge, reason and the concepts of libertarian democracy as matters
of faith as well as law.

Religion
is growing around the world, and the Pew Research Center has predicted that
Islam will overtake Christianity as the world’s largest religion by 2070. Religion will continue to play a major role
in shaping cultural values and law in the future, for good and for bad. Islam is in transition, and Muslims will
determine whether their religion is compatible with libertarian democracy and
human rights or is a form Islamism that seeks to impose shari’a on others.

Islamist
terrorism depends upon the legitimacy of Islamism which has been enhanced among
young Muslims by U.S. military interventions in the Middle East and sustained by
apostasy and blasphemy laws that prohibit any criticism of political
Islam. The freedoms of religion and
speech would allow moderate Muslims to challenge the legitimacy of Islamism
with democracy, libertarian human rights and the secular rule of law, and that
would promote justice and peace in Islam and minimize the threat of Islamist
terrorism to the rest of the world.

The
focus of this website has been on the moral imperatives of faith as standards
of legitimacy rather than on mystical beliefs.
The greatest commandment to
love God and neighbor brings together the moral and mystical dimensions of
religion, and it is a common word of
faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims. Imposing
religious laws on others is not an act of love.
If we love our neighbors we will seek to liberate them from the
oppression of fundamentalist religion so that they can experience the freedoms
of libertarian democracy and the secular rule of law.

Notes
and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics
are: Religion and New Beginnings:
Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, January 4, 2015; The Greatest Commandment, January 11,
2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the
Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus
Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and
Muslims Today? January 25, 2015; Faith
as a Source of Morality and Law: The Heart of Legitimacy, April 12, 2015; Religion and Human Rights, February 22,
2015; Religion, Human Rights and National
Security, May 10, 2015; De Oppresso
Liber: Where Religion and Politics Intersect, May 24, 2015; The Future of Religion: In Decline and Growing, June 7, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Legitimacy as a Context and Paradigm to Resolve Religious Conflict, August 23, 2015; The European Refugee Crisis and Radical
Islam, September 6, 2015; The Muslim
Stranger: A Good Neighbor or a Threat, October 25, 2015; A Containment Strategy to Defeat Islamist
Terrorism, November 1, 2015; and American
Exceptionalism: The Power of Persuasion or Coercion, November 15, 2015.